Warning: If you stay here long enough you will gain weight! Grazing here strongly suggests that you are either omnivorous, or a glutton. And you might like cheese-doodles.
BTW: I'm presently searching for another person who likes cheese-doodles.
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Tuesday, February 13, 2007

THE QURAN, THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD AND HIS CHILD BRIDE, UNDESIRABLES, TERRORISTS, AND OTHER SUBJECTS

Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders of the Freedom party said yesterday that if Muslims want to stay and be a part of (Dutch) society they should tear out half the Quran and discard it, as it espouses values and attitudes which are incompatible with western civilization. He also made mention of Muhammad's favourite wife, Aisha, whom the prophet became engaged to when she was six, and married (with consummation) when she was nine. He further pointed out that if the prophet Muhammad were alive today, he would have to be deported as an undesirable or locked up as a terrorist. Naturally, the internet is buzzing, with several writers having fits.

His party has nine seats. Judging by some of the reactions, they may have two or three times that number after the next election (four years from now, or earlier, if the just formed cabinet falls).

He's a hatemonger, and intemperate. But he's also a ballsy loudmouthed gadfly. And pisses off the standard-issue Dutch politicians and Hague bureaucrats.Sort of the Pim Fortuyn of anti-Islamists.[His site was where I first found the cartoons, by the way.]

For some odd reason, many Dutch, who normally support all the usual liberal humanist progressive points of view, seem to be of the opinion that if he gets whacked, that's to be expected, only natural, perfectly all right, and his own fault.

They may be overlooking the idea that he has every right to say whatever intolerant thing he wants to, and has a right to protection if there are threats upon his life.

Instead, many have opined that a recently uncovered plot to assassinate him in a suicide car-bomb attack which aimed to also kill as many innocent bystanders as possible was probably justified.[How do you say 'chicken' in Dutch? Kip. But it doesn't have quite the same connotations. Say 'lafaard' (coward) instead.]

According to the file, the planners were not fundamentalists, but merely sought revenge on behalf of Muslims and Islam. There have been a multitude of threats on Wilders' life in the past, primarily because he will not shut up and play nice with the Muslims.

As you might have noticed, we Dutch speakers sometimes get a mouth on, and say things which are not exactly easy on the digestion. Geert Wilders, whose opinions I mostly do not share, seems to have a talent for that. A talent which Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh also had.

Abrasive utterances are a fine Dutch tradition, treasured because they get under the skin of all the right people. They should be encouraged, especially in a country which suffers from massive mental rigidity such as the Netherlands. Dutch deftigheid often needs a clout in the face or a poke in the eye.

If anything happens to Geert Wilders, the public discourse will be less offensive, but very much poorer, and likely stifled.

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About Me

Early middle-aged, younger looking than you. And hardly any arthritis. Really.
Resident of the Bay Area, though formerly of somewhere in the Netherlands - living in Europe with a US passport can be an adventure.
I should also mention that I am not a Red-Sea pedestrian. Make of that what you will.
Regrettably single.